This UPDATE features resources for Hiroshima/Nagasaki Day events, August Nuclear Free Future Month and beyond.  Peace Action is managing the national register this year. Please send basic information (time, place, event description, sponsors,etc.) to  http://www.peace-action.org/nukes/campaigns/hndays. You can also use the register to find an event near you.

In this issue:

1. Declare August 6 Global Nuclear Weapons Disarmament Day
2. Invite the WILPF sponsored Proposition One Road Show to your community
3. Protest the U.S. Nuclear Weapons Test  planned for August 23.
   
4. UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon campaign for nuclear weapons and disarmament and the WILPF Nuclear Free Future Campaign
5. More education and action resources for Hiroshima Nagasaki days from WILPF and our coalition partners (continue to use them from now until the NPT in May.)
6. WILPF says NO! to the nuclear power renaissance!

NOW IS THE TIME TO PLAN FOR HIROSHIMA DAY

DECLARE AUGUST 6 NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT DAY AND ASK CONGRESS TO DO THE SAME!

Wouldn't it be great if Congress did just that?

Well, we are on our way! Burlington Vermont Branch started this campaign last year. They began with a petition to Congress asking that August 6 be declared national Nuclear Weapons Disarmament  Day. They invited other WILPF Branches to join in their campaign, and ten did. They got their Mayor to join, then their Senators and Congressman -- and latest news is that the Vermont legislature has just declared August 6 Nuclear Weapons Disarmament Day in that state!!!

 This year let's follow their lead. Learn how they did it and download the WILPF petition.  For the Mayor's proclamation, the news release on the legislation, the on line petition and more on this campaign--

Read more here

INVITE THE 2010 PROPOSITION ONE ROAD SHOW TO YOUR COMMUNITY!

The  Proposition One 2010 Road Show, promoting local initiatives for nuclear weapons abolition, may be heading your way right now.  This is a good time, during Nuclear Free Future month, to begin planning a Road Show event in your community.

DISARM! co-chair Ellen Thomas and WILPF member and former Washington D.C. Peace Center Director Jay Marx are now touring the country with the Road Show. They are currently in the southwest promoting abolition of nuclear weapons and the conversion of nuclear and other arms industries to provide for human and environmental needs. And they are encouraging peace activists (including WILPFers) in states that have the initiative and/or referendum to follow the example of Washington D.C. and get an initiative similar to their Proposition One on the local ballot.

The Road Show is  sponsored by both WILPF DISARM!  and Washington D.C. WILPF Branch. Other endorsers, include CODE PINK and Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Powqer in Space.

Read more here on how you can join this powerful push for a Nuclear Free Future and a peace economy that  serves human needs for peace, freedom and security!

PROTEST THE NUCLEAR WEAPONS TEST PLANNED FOR AUGUST 22-23

Once again the U.S. war hawks have defied the world-wide call for nuclear disarmament. Another nuclear weapon Minute Man III nuclear missile test from Vandenberg Air Force Base is scheduled for August 23, during Nuclear Free Future month.Even though it will not be armed with nuclear warheads, in WILPF we believe these launches send a dangerously contradictory message to a world expecting leadership from the USA toward nuclear weapons abolition.Read about the missiles and view photos here. 

WILPF DISARM! is already organizing  a protest vigil with the help of UFPJ, Global Network, Code Pink, War Resisters League and others.  Contact MacGregor Eddy if you might participate or have ideas or suggestions to share for the vigil or for related actions.  Watch for plans on this UPDATE as they evolve. We are encouraging local vigils publicizing the launch on or near the weekend of August  22-23.You can also email letters of support or arrange to send an appropriate banner or sign which also gives the name of your Branch or organization.

This is the second nuclear weapons missile launched during the Obama Administration. The first occured on June 29. MacGregor Eddy organized a midnight vigil then with the help of northern California WILPF Branches. View photos and slideshow  here. (Hint: At bottom of first slide you can set the number of seconds per slide. so there is time to read the captions.) Thirty protesters, including WILPFers and their friends from Code Pink, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Western States Legal Foundation and Global Network made the long night journey from San Francisco, Los Angeles and cities between to participate. You can also read the report posted on the WILPF web...

 Before the  June launch almost three hundred WILPF members and friends signed on to our WILPF letter to President Obama protesting the June 29th  launch of the Minuteman III and urging cancellation of the test.

The letter was faxed with the "signatures" to President Obama, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Secretary of State Hilary Clinton and United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice.

UN SECRETARY GENERAL BAN KI MOON

AND THE WILPF NUCLEAR FREE FUTURE CAMPAIGN

On June 13 Ban Ki Moon gave another important speech launching a 100 day WMD (We Must Disarm) campaign leading up to the International Day of Peace on September 21.  He is asking  Governments and citizens of the world to focus on the important issues of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation as first steps to gheneral and complete disarmament. Read this important speech here!

Also hear Ban Ki Moon on U-Tube speaking on 1325 and .the role of women in peace building and peace keeping. Here is one influential man listening to women for a change!

Sign the Declaration supporting UN Secretary Ban Ki Moon's messages on nuclear disarmament.  Let's make our voices heard!

1. International WILPF Resources
2. United for Peace and Justice
3. Mayors for Peace
   
4. Alliance for Nuclear Accountability
5. Nuclear Weapons Free World
6. Abolition 2000

1) WILPF Reaching Critical Will Resources : These are especially helpful for those asked to give talks for Hiroshima/Nagasaki days, or who are seriously preparing themselves to educate Congress and/or their communities for a Nuclear Free Future.

On WILPF Reaching Critical Will (at the UN in New York) you will find important information to share with your Congressional delegation and your community. All of us seeking to educate Congress and our communities should find this information very useful.

• Follow in detail progress at the Conference on Disarmament, sole UN disarmament negotiating body which is finally moving forward again after 10 years with no program of work due largely to U.S. recalcitrance.
• Read details of the successful Nuclear Weapons Non-Proliferation Treaty  Prep Com which eight U.S. WILPF members attended in May. U.S.WILPF gave a seminar for delegates and NGOs on U.S. Prospects for a Nuclear Free Future. A U.S. delegate was in attendance. . Read the report by Susi Snyder and AnnJanetteRosga on page 8 of the NPT News in Review.
  
• Follow the General Assembly First Committee which meets in October to discuss and propose resolutions on disarmament issues.
• Research, expose and/or dialogue with Dirty Dozen nuclear weapons producing corporations in your community that promote and profit from the nuclear industry.  

Also investigate the Disarmament pages of the WILPF Geneva website for a variety of resources you can use to educate yourselves and your community on nuclear disarmament.

2) United for Peace and Justice Nuclear Weapons Abolition and Human Security Working Group: The WILPF DISARM! Leadership Team has decided to emphasize cooperation with this working group as we prepare for the NPT.We have begun by describing the program and featuring the UFPJ sponsored petition in an all member e-alert. The petition will be officially launched this month and be presented next spring to President Obama, President Medvedev, and to Secretary General Ban Ki Moon and the assembly of delegates at the UN Nuclear Non-Proliferatin Five Year Review Conference.  Access and sign the on line petition here if you have not already done so. Then forward it to your friends.

Joseph Gerson of New England American Friends Service Committee is a national leader of the UFPJ nuclear abolition campaign and his article in Common Dreams gives both excellent background for the current campaign and an outline of overall plans between now and May, 2010. The DISARM chair and two other members of the U.S. WILPF DISARM! Leadership Team participated in the New York planning meeting of which Joseph writes.  

WILPF is a dues paying member of UFPJ and DISARM! also has three permanent representatives active in the Nuclear Weapons Abolition working group. It is chaired by Jackie Cabasso, Executive Director of Western States Legal Foundation and also a WILPF member. Read and share Jackie's perceptive article, Rhetoric vs Reality, on the continuing obstacles to real progress toward nuclear disarmament. DISARM! regards this as a basic document for our own work.

Unfortunately the  UFPJ Nuclear Free Future website was not updated in time to receive reports on events for Hiroshima/Nagasaki days this year.

Send your reports instead to  Peace Action, another UFPJ member. That organization has now volunteered to manage the national register. Please go to http://www.peace-action.org/nukes/campaigns/hndays. and follow instructions. You can also use the register to find an event near you. After you finish (or before you begin) scroll down the page and find a list of the first 100 organizations to register events. Read some of their details for inspiration! Please also let DISARM! know if you Branch is organizing or participating in an event. 

 WILPF is a dues paying member of UFPJ and DISARM! has three representatives in the Nuclear Weapons Abolition working group. It is chaired by Jackie Cabasso, Executive Director of Western States Legal Foundation and also a WILPF member. Read and share Jackie's perceptive article, Rhetoric vs Reality, on the continuing obstacles to real progress toward nuclear disarmament. DISARM! regards this as a basic document for our own work.

Jackie is also the  U.S. coordinator for Mayors for Peace. We are proud of Jackie and her wonderful contributions on nuclear abolition to the international and national movements, as well as to all of us in WILPF. But she is definitely on overload and needs our help and support.

3) Mayors for Peace has only Mayors and City Councils as members, but we WILPFers have been enlisting many of our own Mayors in this campaign: Check the list of 2,635 member cities to see if your Mayor is listed there. If not Mayors for Peace will supply the materials needed for his/her enlistment.

If your Mayor is a Mayor for Peace ask her/him to sign the Hiroshima-Nagasaki protocol, which would commit all nations party to the NPT to cease production of nuclear warheads and delivery vehicles immediately and begin negotiations (involving all UN member states) on a treaty abolishing such weapons. 

Read the background information for Mayors on the protocol, including names of Mayors who have already signed in 2008-09. These include Mayors of cities with WILPF Branches such as Boston, Burlington, DesMoines, Newton MA, Ashland and Portland OR, Sacramento, Santa Barbara and San Francisco. Ask your own Mayor to participate in local commemorations.and, better yet, declare August 6 Nuclear Weapons Disarmament Day.

 U.S. Mayors (including many who are not yet Mayors for Peace) unanimously adopted a resolution calling on President Obama to take the initiative in negotiations for the treaty abolishing nuclear weapons!!! Mayors of Burlington Vermont and Santa Barbara were among the eight Mayors who sponsored the resolution. (Bravo to those WILPF Branches!)

Support the Mayor's resolution on Hiroshima/Nagasaki days and beyond! Sign and circulate the petition for no targeting of cities and for nuclear weapons abolition by 2020. This is a great petition to circulate at WILPF and coalition Hiroshima/Nagasaki events. Petitions should be returned to Mayors for Peace for delivery to the United Nations at the NPT.

 5) Nuclear Weapons Free World:  Support President Obama in his call for a nuclear weapons free world and sign the WILPF supported  on-line petition. Learn about the campaign and download some of the resources and fact sheets. Explore the campaign page to see the web sites of almost fifty of our national partner co-sponsors, and also download by state some of their many affiliates. U.S. WILPF is already a member of the campaign network and WILPF Branches are also invited to sign up and participate in this nationwide joint effort. With the support of Reaching Critical Will WILPF has much to contribute nationally and in our own communities.

6) ABOLITION 2000:  Go to the Abolition 2000 website for information on the Flame campaign, the World Peace March, IRENA, the model treaty on nuclear weapons abolition and much, much more. WILPF is a member of this iinternational network of over 2000 NGOs working for nuclear weapons abolition. Susi Snyder, our dynamic WILPF Secretary General in Geneva, is on the Executive Committee.